It was a bit of a struggle getting to work on time Monday morning for a variety reasons you don’t want to know about. And maybe you don’t want to know the following but here goes:
This is a story about how one little mistake now, can result in a pile of problems later – the old stitch in time routine.
In an anxious dash to get from doorstep to car door on the first day of a busy week, I forgot a very important item: a lunch bag containing my homemade morning bran muffin and my eight-ounce cup of orange juice. These are vital commodities in my life come exactly 10 a.m. every day, at which time I dine calmly on them while reading the news on the Internet. But Monday, there was no tasty muffin, no chilled orange juice and at 9:59 a.m., panic set in. Weighing my options, which were to go without my snack or to drive home at noon, pick it up, and have it later, I realized there was really only one realistic course of action available to me. l would have to go out and actually buy and pay for a store-made muffin and bottle of juice.
And this is what I discovered about how deceptively simple that procedure might look on a Monday morning.
I hopped in the car and drove to a variety store not far from the office. Dashing in, I discovered they sold orange juice by the bucketful only and I was not that thirsty, or willing to part with that much dough. Back in the car, I headed to a nearby coffee shop, and stood in line. Eventually, I made it to the front, ordered a muffin and juice to go and when they came, l realized my wallet was as empty as a rain barrel at the Equator. Producing my bank debit card to cover the sum, I was informed the shop did not have a debit machine. I fled the place as though I’d absconded with some chocolate pies, and drove madly back to the variety store, willing now to buy the jug of juice. I’d just pick up a muffin from the store’s supply …
Except, the store hadn’t gotten in its Monday morning supply yet. Frantic and near to shaking now, I climbed back into my vehicle and sped to the parking lot of a nearby department store, certain they’d have the items I so desperately, by now, required. They had bran muffins, alright, but only in packages of six. That, I could handle, I decided, but stopped dead again when I realized my orange juice options came only in two-litre pails.
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Once again, frugality trumped famine and the muffins went back onto the shelf. This store gives cash back on your debit card, but not without a purchase, so I grabbed a box of facial tissues, hurried to a checkout, and completed the transaction.
Opening the car door, I tossed in the tissue box and drove the short distance to the drive-through of the same coffee shop I’d run out of 15 minutes before. Sitting behind several cars, I contemplated the irony of rushing so hard just to take a rest, when it was my turn to order.
“Bran muffin with orange juice,” I squawked exhaustedly into the speaker through which a voice had just asked for my order. At the second window, I produced my crisp new 20 and handed it over as though it was the key to heaven.
“Have a nice day,” smiled the girl as I grabbed the brown bag from her hand and threw my change on the seat.
“A little late for that,” I thought, and drove out the exit to the street where I waited for a stoplight.
But back in front of my computer, muffin and juice before me, all was quickly forgotten. And perhaps because of the herculean effort required to hunt it down, that muffin was just about the best I’ve ever tasted.
©2004 Jim Hagarty
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